


Changing Plans

by bewaretheboojum



Series: Learning to Adapt [1]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Red Robin (Comics), Robin (Comics), Superboy (Comics), Young Justice (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Angst, Fluff, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:55:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24111682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bewaretheboojum/pseuds/bewaretheboojum
Summary: AU - Future Fic - Written for Tim/Kon Week 2020 Prompt 1 - FutureTim and Kon have taken on the mantle of Batman and Superman but the transition hasn't gone smoothly.
Relationships: Tim Drake/Kon-El | Conner Kent
Series: Learning to Adapt [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1741612
Comments: 2
Kudos: 69
Collections: TimKon Week





	Changing Plans

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Firefox for the beta help!

"You need to flank him on your left!"

Tim felt a wave of annoyance and anger hit him as Bruce's voice came though his communicator. Doing his best to ignore both Bruce and the sophomoric impulse to tell him off, Tim kept his eyes firmly on the alien craft in front of him.

He was flying a smaller iteration of the League's Javelin. A one-seater built for combat runs and equipped with various projectiles designed for combat in space. It was fast, responsive, and best of all, well-armed. Tim had, over the past few months he had been training with the craft, added his own modifications and adjustments.

A beeping called Tim's attention to the instrument panel, the radar indicated an enemy ship just behind him. Tim flicked his fingers quickly over the controls, taking evasive action. He was fast, but not fast enough. Something hit the tail of his plane, and Tim was thrown against his seatbelt.

The impact knocked the air from his lungs and it took a minute before Tim recovered enough to accelerate away from the other ship and evade further impact.

"Your left! Your left!" Bruce shouted into Tim's ear-piece again as Tim veered right, skirted one alien craft, and decelerated.

"Batman, Mr. Terrific here," Michael's voice came in over the League coms sounding exasperated. "The battle plans state you need to be moving left to flank--"

"The battle plans aren't working," Tim gritted out. "We’re clearly being overwhelmed. I'm improvising."

Then Tim had Bruce and Michael shouting at him over two different comlinks.

Perfect.

Objectively, Tim understood their concerns. The last time an alien species had invaded their airspace, things hadn't ended well. Both Bruce and Kal had been injured badly enough they decided they couldn't keep up in the field anymore. While Kal was all healed up, Bruce was still recovering from his injuries and the pain made him less than reasonable sometimes. 

About three months ago, Tim had taken over for Bruce as Batman, Kon had taken over for Kal as Superman, and Cassie was working with the League as Wonder Woman. Usually, things went smoothly but...

Sometimes Bruce and the old guard in the League didn't take kindly to a couple of twenty-somethings questioning their beloved battle plans.

Case in point.

"Everyone in the field, report your locations! Is anyone close to the mothership?" Tim called to the rest of the League over their coms, ignoring Bruce and Michael.

Kon was the first to reply.

"I'm about a quarter-mile out from the mothership," Kon gasped out. "We're getting crushed over here. We'll need reinforcements if we're going to win this."

"I have a plan," Tim assured him. "Wonder Woman?"

"I"m just behind you," Cassie replied before Tim heard a loud crash at the rear of his craft. "Keep an eye on your six, would you Wonder Boy?"

Six other league members all chimed in after, reporting in their locations to Tim.

Tim’s eyes moved quickly over his instrument panel, taking in the location of his teammates, the mothership, and the enemy fliers.

"Fall back!" Tim instructed them all. "I've got this."

"What do you mean you've got this?" Kon asked, his voice suddenly worried.

"Fall back!" Tim commanded again and then hit his accelerator, blasting past a series of enemy ships and making his way to the mothership in mere seconds.

Nearly everyone was shouting at him over the coms when Tim called up a missile. Tim had added several projectiles armed with a device that would emit an electromagnetic pulse as soon as it penetrated its target. The pulse would disable all electronics onboard the craft it hit while causing no damage to the rest of the ship or anyone on board. 

Tim hit the trigger on the launcher, the missile shot out of his ship and Tim took off, diving into evasive maneuvers as the missile hurtled towards the mothership.

Tim could tell the exact moment the EMP went off because the spaceship went dead in the water, so to speak. The lights went out and the craft seemed to drift rather than fly. All the other enemy ships paused in their attacks, then turned back towards the mothership.

All the shouting voices over the coms went silent as the members of the League watched as the enemy fliers began evacuating the mother ship. Moments later, the ships took off back into the depths of space.

"They're... retreating..." Michael said, breaking the silence on the comlinks.

"It worked?" Kon asked, sounding surprised.

Tim had, by this time, flown his ship back to the Watchtower, the rest of the League trailing back in behind him. A few stayed behind to make sure none of the fliers decided to press their luck and attack the Watertower.

"Of course it worked," Tim replied acidly over the coms. "I told you I had a plan."

"You didn't say you had a plan that involved you hurtling towards an enemy enclave!" Kon shot back, anger clear in his voice. In his other ear, Bruce agreed with Kon. Vehemently.

Tim turned off both of the comlinks as he docked his ship in the Watchtower's vehicle bay.

Puffing out a breath of air, Tim tilted his head back in exhaustion. The ears of his cowl caught on the back of the seat, tugging his neck painfully and Tim cursed, frustration flowing through him. The exhaustion pulling at him just exacerbated the annoyance and anger flowing through him.

Kon had been right, he should have explained what he was doing. But with Bruce and Michael both shouting at him, and Kon and Cassie taking such heavy fire, Tim had felt so overwhelmed in the moment that all he felt like he could do was act.

Not the best way to handle the situation but...

Hitting the button to shoot the hatch door open, Tim pulled himself out of the ship. Kon, Michael, Cassie, and Jo'nn were all glaring up at him from below.

Clenching his teeth, Tim told himself not to lose his temper again as he climbed down to the floor of the vehicle bay below.

"Batman, you need to get approval from the person running coms before changing strategy," Michael started in almost immediately.

Tim ignored him instead, turning to take in Kon and Cassie, who were both also glaring at him.

Kon looked...

Kon looked angry and... adult... in ways that made Tim's breath catch for a minute.

While Tim had opted on a new design for the Batsuit when he took over for Bruce, Kon had mostly stuck with Kal's classic look. The only difference being he kept a little black in the background of the symbol on his chest.

When Kon was in uniform, he slicked his hair back now, like Kal had. It made his face, usually softened with a smile and quirked eyebrow, look more serious, more severe, more...

Shaking his head, Tim stalked past them all, waving them off with one hand. No one followed him as he made his way to his room in the Watchtower. The minute the door closed behind him, Tim pulled off his mask. He sighed with relief to have his face uncovered as he tugged off his belt. He tossed the belt and his cowl on the table in his small bedroom.

There were days when the Batsuit just felt stifling. Hiro had helped him design it. They had made it light and flexible and they had armed it with more toys than Bruce could have ever even dreamed of. But they had switched to a full face mask to try to hide, as much as possible, that the Batman patrolling today had a very different facial structure than the one who had been patrolling three months ago. 

The new design offered him more armor, more protection, it hid his face and identity but…

It was stifling.

He was just pulling the heavily armored uniform top off over his head when the door to his room slid open and Kon stalked inside.

Kon was still fully suited up, a gas mask hanging at his hip. His suit was stained with something black and it had several rents along one side. One of his boots was charred at the toe and dirt smudged his cheek.

"What the fuck was that, man?" Kon hissed as the door closed behind him.

Tim felt the anger, the frustration, roil up inside of him again. His stomach knotted and his face flushed with the heat of emotions. Tim felt his hands shaking and he clenched them into fists to get them to stop.

"You forgot how to knock--" Tim started in but Kon cut him off.

"Oh, don't give me that shit," Kon said, eyes flashing red for a minute as his feet came up off the ground.

Hovering just a few centimeters above the floor, Kon floated over to Tim. His jaw was set with anger, his mouth was pressed into a thin line.

Tim...

Tim hated to see him angry.

Kon didn't look like himself when he was angry.

He looked like someone Tim didn't recognize.

Taking a deep breath, Tim tried to calm himself, use some of the deep breathing exercises he had learned to control his emotions.

It wasn't helping.

Tim had always had a temper, one trait he had inherited from his Dad. He was better at controlling it than his father ever had been but there were still days when Tim got mad enough that he felt like he could pull a TV off the wall too.

"What the fuck was that?" Kon said again, his voice tight and tense with anger.

Tim felt his temper flare right up again, wheeling he turned to face Kon head on.

"I told you I had a plan--"

"There was already a plan, man! A plan that didn't involve you flying headlong into the middle of enemy combatants with no one watching your six!!"

Tim... really didn't like being shouted at.

It wasn't that he wasn't used to it. Bad guys, supervillains, cops, and criminals yelled at him all the time.

But that didn't mean Tim liked it.

Tim liked it even less when someone he cared about yelled at him.

"I'm not having this conversation with you if you're just going to shout at me," Tim bit out, Kon made to interrupt him but Tim waved him off. "You should go."

Kon went still then, and silent. He was still hovering in the air just inches from Tim but Tim could tell he wasn't even breathing just then. His eyes were hot with anger and his mouth was turned down into a frown.

"No," Kon said through clenched teeth.

"No?" Tim repeated back, incredulous.

"No. No. No, I'm not doing this again."

"Doing what again?"

"The thing where I get mad at you and instead of you fucking dealing with that, you break up with me and then two weeks later, when we both get over it again, we get back together but never actually fucking resolve anything. I'm not doing it again."

Tim felt his stomach drop out at that. His throat constricted and a flash of fear shot through him. He and Kon had been sleeping together off and on since just after Tim's twenty-second birthday. That had been close to two years ago and...

Kon was right.

They never did resolve anything because Tim was too scared and way too stubborn and Kon was just used to backing off when Tim got that way and...

Now maybe that had fucked this up. Maybe Tim had fucked this up.

For both of them.

"What does that mean?" Tim asked, trying not to wince as he heard how thick with emotion his voice was. He couldn't look at Kon then, he couldn't stand to see the fury in his face.

"It means I'm not leaving," Kon answered hotly. "It means I'm staying right fucking here until you tell me what the hell that was."

Tim stilled then, looking up at Kon. His face was still full of anger but... he wasn't going to leave.

Tim took a deep, shaky breath then, feeling his knees get weak. Tim slumped down to a sitting position on the hard, narrow bed in his room. Pulling his gloves off, Tim ran a sweaty hand over his face and shook his head.

"I just-- There was so much going on..." Tim said, closing his eyes as his shoulders hunched. "I had Michael shouting at me in one ear, Bruce shouting at me in the other and the whole time I knew it wasn't working and that you and Cassie were taking fire and I knew I had to move in to at least give us some breathing room but--"

As Tim trailed off, he felt Kon settling onto the bed beside him, sitting shoulder to shoulder with Tim. He felt warm and solid next to Tim.

It made Tim's throat tighten even more.

"Usually, when we change plans in the field you say something..." Kon ventured. "You explain it to me and Cassie."

"Usually I don't have eighteen people questioning my judgment!" Tim shouted, pulling his hand from his face and turning to look at Kon. "Usually you and Cassie trust me to make calls like that. Now, I have everyone pushing back whenever I try to fix things in the field and I--" Tim closed his eyes and shook his head again. He had to swallow twice around the lump in his throat before he could continue. "Usually you trust me..."

Kon reached out and cupped Tim's face with a warm, broad hand. Leaning in close, he pressed their foreheads together. Tim breathed in the familiar scent of Kon, masked as it was by the heat and sweat of the battle.

"I do trust you," Kon whispered to him. "But I was afraid. After what happened to Bruce..." Kon trailed off, his voice thick with emotion. It took him a moment before he could continue. "Bruce was lucky he ever woke up from that coma. And I don't know what it would have done to Kal, to all of us, if he hadn't. But I do know I wouldn't be able to handle it if something like that ever happened to you. So I was afraid."

"Me too," Tim confessed, reaching up to wrap his arms around Kon's broad shoulders.

Kon tugged at Tim then, laying them both down on the bed with Tim curled up on Kon's chest. Wrapping his arms around Tim's shoulders, Kon just held Tim close for a few long moments, breathing deep.

"We'll get used to this," Tim said eventually. "It's just that it's new. It'll be easier soon. For everyone."

"I know," Kon said on a sigh, "just..."

"Just what?"

"Don't get blown up by aliens..."

Tim snorted a laugh and shook his head. "I'll do my best," he promised.

"And stop trying to break up with me. You're not good at it."

"I'm not good at it?"

"No, you're not good at it. We always end up back together."

"That's... a valid point."

Kon kissed Tim's temple then, as if that settled it. Tim huffed out a small laugh and pressed his face into Kon's neck.

"I don't want to go back out there and deal with Michael," Tim groaned.

"That sounds like a problem for Tomorrow Tim and Tomorrow Kon. Tonight Tim and Tonight Kon are gonna take a shower and make fun of how dumb his pants are and then go to sleep."

"He does have very dumb pants," Tim agreed.

"Who fights crime in pants that tight?"

"That's exactly what I've been saying for years!"

"Yeah, but no one listens to you about it because you started your career in short pants."

"Which should make me the expert on what pants not to wear when fighting an eternal battle for truth and justice."

"I'll be sure to point that out tomorrow when we tell him he needs to tone it down."

Tim looked up at Kon, curiously.

"You'll back me up?"

Kon lifted a hand to cup Tim's cheek and pulled him into a soft kiss.

"Always, Wonder Boy," Kon whispered against his lips.

Tim smiled and kissed him back.

"Thanks."

They did eventually shower, ignoring several insistent buzzes at Tim's door as they changed for bed. When Tim fell asleep that night, in his cramped narrow bed with Kon's body pressed close to his, he felt more relaxed than he had in three months.


End file.
